Birthright Citizenship

Birthright Citizenship is the argument — never affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court — that babies physically born in the United States obtain automatic citizenship by virtue of their place of birth, even if born to illegal aliens. This theory is based on the first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment, which reads, "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside." Under this theory, a child born to illegal immigrants automatically holds U.S. citizenship, and a child born of an illegal alien mother is eligible to sponsor legal immigration for other relatives when the child turns 21 years of age.

An argument against birthright citizenship is the long tradition that children born to foreign diplomats while in the United States do not thereby become American citizens. For many years American Indians — including those born in the United States — were not considered to be citizens either.

Some 380,000 children are born in the United States each year to illegal-alien mothers, according to U.S. Census data. [1]

No policy exists that forbids DHS from deporting the illegal-alien parents of children born in the U.S.